Lawmakers on a joint committee reviewing an already-released scathing audit of the Colorado Energy Office disagreed Wednesday whether auditors should have interviewed the previous administration.

The audit, which covered four years of Gov. Bill Ritter’s administration and two years of Gov. John Hickenlooper’s administration, reported that the office was unable to demonstrate whether $252 million spent over the past six years was spent cost-effectively. However, the audit does not say the money was misspent or was spent ineffectively.

Both governors are Democrats.

“As a freshman, a rookie, this report is quite appalling” and erodes the public’s trust in government, said Rep. Perry Buck, R-Windsor.

But Sen. Matt Jones, D-Louisville, said he thinks the results might have been different had the state audit staff talked to the previous administration.

“When you say this wasn’t spent cost-effectively, that’s a pretty sweeping generalization,” which has resulted in “sweeping repercussions,” Jones said.

Rep. Jerry Sonnenberg, R-Sterling, told auditors they did the right thing.

“I don’t want you being spun by talking with someone else,” he said, adding that Republicans lawmakers have long worried about the energy office being some sort of “slush” fund.

Republican lawmakers tangled with Ritter over his emphasis on a “new energy economy” and have pointed to the audit as proof their concerns were valid.

But Ritter and his energy director, former Rep. Tom Plant, have questioned why a 2010 audit of federal stimulus and grant money funneled to the energy office resulted in a “no issues” favorable finding.

And Plant said the energy office has experienced a high turnover since Hickenlooper took office in January 2011 and he might have been able to answer questions the new staff could not.

Michelle Colin, a legislative audit manager who oversaw the recent energy-office audit, said the audit team bases its results on documentation, not interviews with people who have left state government.

“When we audit any organization in the state, we expect the documentation, the information that we need, to be within that organization,” she said. “We do not say in the audit report that they misspent these funds and we didn’t say they were not spent cost effectively. We said they were not able to provide us documentation to show us they were spent cost effectively.”

The committees that reviewed the audit were House Transportation and Energy; House Agriculture, Livestock and Natural Resources; and Senate Agriculture, Natural Resources and Energy Committee.

State law requires legislative committees to review performance audits of departments they oversee.

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